


Snowmen and Redemption

by octopus_fool



Series: Yuletide Cheer [31]
Category: The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Difficult Decisions, Emotional Baggage, Gen, Snowmen, Winter
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-25
Updated: 2018-12-25
Packaged: 2019-09-26 17:30:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 669
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17146019
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/octopus_fool/pseuds/octopus_fool
Summary: As Elrond and Elros attempt to build a snowman, Maglor and Maedros discuss what to do with them.





	Snowmen and Redemption

**Author's Note:**

> Merry Christmas to all those who celebrate it! A lovely winter day to all those who do not (or summer day, for those in the southern hemisphere)!
> 
> Written for day 25 of [Arda Advent](http://ardaprompts.tumblr.com/post/180626386876/join-me-in-creating-wintery-fanworks-about), the prompt was "snowman". I can't believe I made it to the end of this! :)

The ball of snow wobbled in its path, but the two children pushing it managed to roll it through the deep snow until it reached a considerable size. Satisfied with the result, they started the next ball.

Maedhros stepped next to Maglor where he was watching the two children from the balustrades. 

“She would have contacted us by now. She’s not going to attempt to trade the silmaril for them, or she isn’t capable of doing so. It’s getting time to send them somewhere where they will be raised properly, by their people.”

Maglor said nothing. Below them, the building of the snowman was briefly abandoned when Elrond threw a snowball at Elros, who of course didn’t let the attack go without retaliation. 

“You know what I’m saying is true,” Maedhros said.

“Do you remember when it snowed in Tirion?” Maglor asked. “We’d have the most spectacular snowball fights. At least at first. Later we all lost interest in snowball fights, only Ambarussa still occasionally went outside for them, we others were all too caught up in politics and our crafts.”

“They aren’t Ambarussa.”

“I miss them.”

“Yes, so do I. But these children aren’t going to replace Ambarussa, nor is caring for them going to make up for anything that we did. Sending them to their people is the best thing we can do, both in terms of practicality and in terms of morals.”

Elros caught up with Elrond and they rolled in the snow, trying to get snow into each other’s faces before they both burst into laughter.

“It is just so nice to have some laughter and hope around,” Maglor said quietly.

“It is false hope,” Maedhros pointed out. “Hope that we do not deserve and that is unfounded for us. The oath will get in the way of everything that seems like a normal life.”

“Perhaps not. The silmaril is out of reach for us, and the other two are even less obtainable. Perhaps we will have the chance to settle down for a while, to raise these boys.”

“That is madness. You cannot expect to play the happy family. They will ask questions, and the questions will get harder to answer as they get older. They will ask about what happened to their mother in more detail, and what role we played in that. The sooner they go, the less attached you will grow to them. They do not belong here.”

The two boys stemmed the second ball of snow onto the first and fixed it there with even more snow. Then they started on the third ball.

Maglor shrugged. “We do no have to deprive ourselves of all emotions, you know. Perhaps we wouldn’t be in this situation if we had remembered the value of lives, of emotion earlier and more often.”

“That would have changed nothing, and there were already too many emotions involved in everything that happened. The oath would have still been the same, would have still led us to the same decisions. And taking the boys was the only hope of recovering the silmaril after their mother fled, the hope that she would bargain.”

“It was still wrong,” Maglor said. “And we can try to make up for it by raising them properly.”

“The only thing we can do to make things a little less wrong is to send them back to where they belong. You know as well as I do that we are not fit to raise them. We cannot keep them.”

Maglor watched Elrond and Elros struggle with lifting the third ball onto the second. It fell down, and they were left trying to roll the broken pieces into a new ball. 

“They are not the chance you never got,” Maedhros said. “They are more than a project or an attempt at redemption.”

Maglor said nothing but left to help Elrond and Elros lift the third ball to complete the snowman.

“Do what is right,” Maedhros called after him. “Send them away.”

Maglor did not reply.


End file.
